Ben Kaun, EPRI
Senior Project Manager, Energy Storage and Distributed Generation Program
Ben has over 10 years experience in electric power RD&D. He currently manages research efforts pertaining to energy storage, distributed energy resources (DER), and microgrids. He manages EPRI’s Energy Storage Integration Council (ESIC), a deployment-oriented public, technical forum with a mission to advance integration of safe, reliable, cost-effective energy storage systems. Ben works collaboratively with industry to develop analytical tools and methods to understand the value of energy storage and DER, including the Storage Value Estimation Tool (StorageVET). He serves on the board of the Energy Storage Association. Prior to EPRI, Ben worked with multiple early stage companies to engineer and commercialize Li-ion battery technology, with focus on vehicle electrification.
Ben earned a BS in Industrial & Enterprise Systems Engineering from the University of Illinois and an MS in Management Science & Engineering from Stanford University.
Ravi Manghani, GTM Research
Director, Energy Storage
Ravi is the Director of Energy Storage at GTM Research, where he focuses on U.S. energy storage markets and value chain analysis. As an industry expert, Ravi has been quoted in various publications including New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Forbes, Bloomberg, Christian Science Monitor, Wired and Verge.
Ravi has 8 years of experience in energy storage as a consultant, analyst and engineer. Ravi holds a Master of International Business degree from the Fletcher School of Tufts University, a Master of Science in Chemical Engineering degree from University of Washington, Seattle and a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering degree from Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai, India.Susan Kennedy, AMS
Founder & CEO
Before startinga groundbreaking energy storage company, Susan served for two decades at the highest levels of state and federal government, most recently as chief of staff to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, cabinet secretary and deputy chief of staff to Governor Gray Davis and communications director for U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein. She served from 2003-2006 on California’s Public Utilities Commission, regulating the state’s investor-owned electric utilities, telecommunications providers and private water companies.
Susan’s company, Advanced Microgrid Solutions, is on the leading edge of a complete transformation of the electric grid. Using advanced energy storage systems, AMS is creating the first fleet of Hybrid Electric Buildings in the world, turning portfolios of commercial and industrial buildings into virtual power plants for Southern California Edison. In 2014 her company won the first major contract in the world to use these advanced energy storage technologies on a large scale to replace capacity from the retired facility at San Onofre nuclear facility. AMS is consistently listed as one of the top clean tech companies to watch in the US.
John Jung, Greensmith
President and CEO
As President and CEO of Greensmith, John has led the company from concept to the recognized technology leader in energy storage market since joining in 2009. John was twice awarded Smart Grid Pioneer by SmartGrid Today and the company was selected as the industry’s fastest growing company by Deloitte Fast 500. Greensmith is reaching 200MW of energy storage deployments
globally with both grid-scale and behind-the-meter installations.
Hailing from the B2B data analytics and software space – John firmly believed that grid congestion was more of an IT problem than one solved simply by more or different generation and distribution investments - that energy storage could be the first truly programmable, multi-application appliance available to grid operators. With that vision and now an industry-leading software platform called GEMS, Greensmith is enabling a growing number of the largest power companies globally, including AEP and E.ON who invested in the company, looking to succeed in energy storage.
Prior to Greensmith, John held C-level roles at a number of venture-backed technology companies operating in North America, Europe and Asia, including a software and solutions startup that served 21 of the 25 largest electric utilities in North America. John also served as a strategy practice leader for A.T. Kearney and Braxton Associates and holds an MBA from the Richard Ivey School of
Business. He currently resides in the Bay Area.
Mateo Jaramillo
Former VP of Products and Programs for Tesla Energy
As VP of Products and Programs for Tesla Energy at Tesla Motors, Mateo Jaramillo was responsible for policy, business development, and product management for the company's grid connected energy storage products. Mateo started the stationary storage effort at Tesla in 2009 and in the meantime was additionally the commercial lead on powertrain development and supply programs with Daimler and Toyota, and also started and led through the supercharger program through the first year of deployment.
Prior to Tesla, Mateo was Chief Operating Officer and part of the founding team at Gaia Power Technologies, a pioneering distributed energy storage firm. Mateo began his career in the software industry as a product manager with Predictive Networks, an interactive TV software provider.
He has an AB in Economics from Harvard and a Masters in Theology from Yale. He is a member of the 2016 Class of Henry Crown Fellows and the Aspen Global Leadership Network at the Aspen Institute.
